Monday, April 09, 2007

Newbies

So I managed to get myself locked out of my trailer last night while I was at the gym- forgot to take my key with me.

When I went to check out another key, there were a couple ladies checking in. In Army PT gear, something immediately told me they were officers. As I was waiting, they were talking to the people at the counter about necessities like transformers and such. One lady expressed major disgust at the PX's limited offering.

I mean, we all bitch about it. That's one of the inalienable rights of the soldier from time immemorial; to complain about things. But mostly we do it with a sort of black humour: we don't really expect it to be better.

This soldier seems to have missed the memo. You know, the one about the war...

After explaining to her that you take what you can get, and buy necessities for at least a month or two when they come into the PX because they may be out for 6 weeks at a time. I explained how to get to FOB Blackhawk where they have stuff that sometimes doesn't appear in the PX, like transformers and adapters for the electrical outlets.

With great skepticism and maybe even a little disdain for my advice, she asked me, "But is it safe?"*

WTF?!

I didn't lose it though. I didn't even laugh. I pointed to the wall and asked her if she saw the picture of the nice lady there. "That lady was killed a few days ago when she stepped outside this very shack to take a cell phone call."

Hell no it's not 'safe'. I saw her in uniform today in the palace- how do people make it to the rank of Lt. Colonel with such naivete?

(*Note: The place I pointed her to is across the street behind the PX- a distance of maybe 50 meters.)